How to make preserved lemons

Preserved lemons bring a warm summer sunshine into your store cupboard during the depths of winter. They are quite common in Mediterranean recipes, and you’ll find jars of them in Eastern or Asian food stores.

It’s easy to make your own, and in our house we do it one of two ways: either in a lemony brine or in olive oil (we might even try rapeseed oil next winter).

Brine is cheaper, though you don’t get the benefit of the flavoured oil. Some recipes also insist that you remove the pulp (interior flesh), but it’s “waste not, want not” in the Evening Hérault HQ so we don’t bother.

Both these recipes involve five or six fat lemons (preferably with the leaves attached), and you’ll need a large, sterilised, airtight jar such as a one-pint Kilner pot.

And both recipes need plenty of coarse sea salt. Never table salt, which is far too chemical and harsh.

Recipe #1: Preserved lemons in brine

• Lemons
• Sea salt
• Spices (e.g. fennel seed, cumin seed, coriander seed, peppercorns, a couple of bay leaves, a cinnamon stick, perhaps a pinch of dried chili)

Mix the spices and salt in a bowl.

Cut a cross into each lemon so that you quarter it almost to the base, but so that the quarters still hold together.

Rub plenty of the salt mix into the lemon segments, then reshape the fruit.

Put a tablespoon of the salt into the bottom of the jar.

Pack the lemons as tightly as you can into the jar (the more tightly, the less salt you’ll need), pressing the lemons down to release their juices and sprinkling more salt/spices on them as you go along.

If the juice released from the squashed fruit doesn’t cover them, add some freshly squeezed lemon juice. Leave a little air space before sealing the jar. Seal. Put them away for a month for the preserving process to do its work.

To use, take out the lemons as you need them, and rinse well under running water.

Recipe #2: Preserved lemons in oil

• Lemons
• Sea salt
• Plain olive oil

Wash the lemons, quarter them as in the above recipe.

Roll them in the salt and stuff them tightly in the jar. Leave it overnight in the fridge.

The next day, take the lemons out of the jar, and drain them in a colander for 15 minutes. Rinse the jar, rub it dry with kitchen towel.

Half fill the jar with the olive oil. Shake the lemons to remove excess salt and place them in the jar. Top up with more oil and make sure the lemons are well covered. Seal.

Again, leave for a month before using. The oil itself can also be used in cooking – for example, to flavour a fish dish or a tajine.

Alternatives – preserved oranges

In each case the lemons will be ready in a month, and will last for at least a year.

The same techniques should work perfectly well if you have a glut of oranges or limes, though we’ve still to come across dishes that involve them lads.

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